Dodgers, Zach Neal Agree To Minor League Deal

The Dodgers have agreed to a minor league contract with right-hander Zach Neal, according to Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic (Twitter link). As Rosenthal notes, there’s familiarity between Neal and Dodgers general manager Farhan Zaidi stemming from their time together in the A’s organization from 2013-14. Neal receives an invitation to MLB camp.

Neal debuted in the majors with Oakland in 2016, when he amassed 70 innings of 4.24 ERA pitching in 24 appearances (six starts). While Neal only managed a paltry 3.47 strikeouts per nine innings, he did his best to offset that with a sterling walk rate (0.77 BB/9) and a high groundball percentage (53.0). The 29-year-old struggled with the A’s last season, though, as he tossed just 14 2/3 frames and yielded 13 earned runs on 19 hits (five homers). Neal also wasn’t particularly effective in 21 Triple-A appearances and 16 starts, with a 3.91 K/9 and a 4.82 ERA.

To his credit, Neal walked a mere 11 batters in 113 2/3 innings between the majors and minors in 2017, and he recorded a lofty 23.9 percent infield fly rate at the Triple-A level. Neal has a history of limiting walks, generating grounders and inducing infield pop-ups, which perhaps gives the Dodgers hope that he could turn into a quality major leaguer.

Morrow was a wager but a pretty solid wager given the ability to pitch demonstrated by his history. If he was healthy he was going to be valuable, that was pretty much the only question. I don’t see where the Dodgers have yet to sign anyone with Morrow’s potential. They all seem like longer shots.

Starting to see a bit of a trend here with the Dodgers signings. With K’s and HR’s at historical levels, the Dodgers are taking looks at pitchers who excel at keeping the ball on the ground. Worm burners aren’t pretty, but they’re effective.

It’s interesting, because with power and the balls it makes a lot of sense. In terms of Alexander we all know about his gb prowess, yet his scouting report has indicated he has a pretty good slider. So you’d have to think they might view Alexander as having that “undervalued” “underused” Cingrani-esque extra gear. In terms of worm burners it’d make sense with how good they’ve been on the inf def.

As a milb contract guys makes sense to carry gb guys at AAA. I don’t know if they view him as more than an short term inj insurance policy, but hey there’s always a need for arms at AAA. It’ll also be interesting as a guy like Santana has some K/gb tendencies. It’s all to say this bp could look very different and gb heavy towards the end of the year.